Last week, we talked about follow ups and why they’re so valuable. This week, let’s do a little math and prove it. When I have conversations with business owners about following up, it often comes up that these things are a lot of work. They don’t mean the follow up itself, but the act of […]

8:11 a.m. Kids propped a bike rack against the side of the Smith Valley School to gain access to the roof where they smashed gutters and vents. 11:33 a.m. The mother of a concerned 15-year-old girl called in to report a man that had come to her front door and asked her daughter suspicious questions. […]

Good morning. Happy birthday to the ice-cream cone! On this day in 1904, Charles E. Menches conceived the idea of filling a pastry cone with two scoops of ice-cream, inventing the ice-cream cone. I love this guy. It’s Wednesday folks, and the new Beacon is out on the stands. After three years of legal wrangling, […]

Diane Boyd never intended to spark the Northern Rockies wolf recovery effort. In 1979, as a curious and hard-working graduate student at the University of Montana, she began tracking a wolf that had been trapped and radio-collared earlier in the year after it wandered into the Glacier National Park area from Canada. It was the […]

HELENA – Montana state government finances are doing better than projected — about $210 million better. Many states around the country are reporting fiscal trouble and show surpluses turning to deficits. Not in Montana, though. Gov. Brian Schweitzer said Wednesday that state agencies are spending a little less money than expected and state revenues are […]

The Supreme Court finally bit the bullet, ruling on the good old Second Amendment for the first time since the Dirty Thirties. Wow! “The people” have an individual right to keep and bear arms?!? One needn’t be enlisted in either the National Guard or Militia of Montana?!? Shazam! Handsprings and cartwheels! While some pundits feel […]

HELENA – U.S. Rep. Denny Rehberg of Montana is crediting the Bush administration’s troop surge for progress he says he witnessed during his weekend trip to Iraq. The Republican was part of a bipartisan delegation led by House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey of Wisconsin that traveled to Iraq to meet with Gen. David Petraeus, […]

BILLINGS – Authorities issued a voluntary evacuation order Wednesday morning for more than 100 homes in a subdivision outside Billings that was threatened by a grass-fueled wildfire. Crews from the Billings Fire Department quickly brought the blaze — in the Rehberg Ranch Estates subdivision west of Billings Logan International Airport — under control, and the […]

WASHINGTON – Montana Rep. Denny Rehberg has changed his position on the United States’ long-standing Cuba embargo in recent years, moving away from enthusiastic anti-embargo politics to supporting current restrictions on the country. When Rehberg, a Republican, was first elected to Congress in 2000, he spoke often about his opposition to the embargo, in line […]

6:41 a.m. A jet ski that belonged to a local water sports dealer was spotted a half-mile out in Peaceful Bay. 10:02 a.m. Someone shot a cat on North Hilltop Road in Columbia Falls. The cat survived and is at the vet. 10:42 a.m. Someone flagged down a deputy on Foothill Road to report someone […]

Every Heritage Days, the Columbia Falls Rotary Club and the Columbia Falls Police Department auction off unclaimed bicycles. Your chance to pick up a new-to-you bike on the cheap comes from 9 am to 11 am at the Columbia Falls Police Department. Come early for the best selection. The City and the Club split the […]

12:11 a.m. A 19-year-old man was arrested after he attempted to flee from an officer he threatened to harm with a bottle of alcohol. 1:48 a.m. A caller who had been drinking reported seeing a cougar at a Columbia Falls golf course. 1:58 a.m. The Whitefish fire department was dispatched to Big Mountain Road where […]

Authorities have identified a 27-year-old Kalispell man who was struck and killed by a vehicle near Martin City over the weekend. Cale T. Brown was in the right lane of eastbound traffic on U.S. 2 when he was hit by a car just before 11:30 p.m. Saturday, according to the Montana Highway Patrol. He was […]

Good morning. Alexander Calder, the sculptor who invented the mobile, was born on this date in 1898. On the Beacon this morning, there’s a new option for Kalispell-area horseback riders, mountain bikers and hikers looking to get outside without having to travel too far. Authorities have identified a 27-year-old Kalispell man who was struck and […]

After several hours of public comment, the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks Commission denied a motion that would have suspended the use of a toxin in a westslope cutthroat restoration project in the South Fork Flathead Basin. The commission meeting was scheduled to be a status update on the agency’s Westslope Cutthroat Trout Conservation Program […]